


Solstice

by Calais_Reno



Series: Just Johnlock [12]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Don't copy to another site, Eventual Romance, John Watson Returns to Baker Street, Lost Love, M/M, POV Sherlock Holmes, Post-Season/Series 04, Separations, Winter Solstice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:21:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28170858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calais_Reno/pseuds/Calais_Reno
Summary: It feels like the onset of winter, so gradual that you wake up one day and see ice decorating the windows and wonder when it suddenly became so cold... He lost John slowly, without either of them deciding that’s what would happen. The way to come back together must be so gradual that it’s almost imperceptible.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Series: Just Johnlock [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1856749
Comments: 149
Kudos: 184
Collections: Sherlock Author Showcase 2020





	Solstice

It’s not a sudden thing, like an epiphany. When he realises, he has to stop, collect his thoughts. It feels like the onset of winter, so gradual that you wake up one day and see ice decorating the windows and wonder when it suddenly became so cold.

It’s been more than a year since he talked to John.

He used to measure the time between their visits and calls and texts in minutes, sometimes hours. There was a time, years ago, when he could text him _come at once_ , and John would get in a cab, or run all the way from Tesco, or leave work early. 

Those days are over. He realised this, painfully, soon after he returned to London. Two years of letting John think he was dead had consequences. Ironic, that it took a long hiatus, and a violent greeting at the Landmark, for him to realise what they once had, and to see what he had lost.

He loves John.

Whether John loves him or not is another thing. 

At the wedding, he’d made his own position clear, he thought. His speech was a declaration of love. And he thought he’d done it wrong, but John hugged him, and that was almost like having his feelings requited. It wasn’t wrong to love John. It just wasn’t the right time.

If he waited long enough, he thought, John might love him back.

After the wedding, John didn’t live at Baker Street, so he didn’t pay as much attention to Sherlock. When he lived there, he’d always taken care of Sherlock, and Sherlock told himself that was love. Some kind of love. John is rubbish at saying things.

Sherlock takes care of himself now, keeping off the drugs because John would hate that. When he makes tea, he eats some toast, hearing John’s voice urging him, complaining how thin he’s become.

But John doesn’t do those things anymore because he lives somewhere else. And apparently that is the way he wants it to be.

Sherlock opens his message app, looks at the last text.

_13 Jan 2024 14:26Can I call you back?_

_13 Jan 2024 14:28Of course. SH_

That was over a year ago. He’s still waiting.

He used to ask John along on cases after he came back. It was almost like before, but instead of sitting at 221B afterwards, having a drink and giggling about crime scenes, John would take a cab back to his neat little terrace house, back to Mary. And Sherlock sat alone in the silence of those empty rooms.

If Sherlock texted him, he would usually call him back and they would talk for a few minutes. Sherlock has always preferred texting; he can keep a chain of texts going for hours, making random observations, asking John questions. But John preferred their contact to be well defined, five-minute phone conversations during his lunch or after he arrives home.

That night at the restaurant, while he was trying to repair what he’d broken (John), he understood that Mary was a liar. At the time he was too distracted to figure out what she was lying about, and there were other things, more important things to solve.

As it happens, Mary was an assassin— and didn’t that just make sense? John Watson, who loves danger, was in love with an assassin, and Sherlock hadn’t even noticed because he was only thinking about John being happy with the woman he chose to replace his dead flatmate.

It never occurred to Sherlock that anyone could hurt John as much as he had. The gaping wound left when Sherlock stepped off the roof of St Barts has never healed.

He wonders why he didn’t say something before everything completely fell apart. He saw that she had secrets to protect, he took the bullet that was meant to silence him. He accepted Mycroft’s decision that John should reconcile with her, not only for the sake of the baby, but because there were several open investigations where her involvement was almost certain. They could not afford to tip her off; she would flee, and take the child with her.

John loved her, and she had found a way into his life, his heart, precisely because Sherlock had left that gaping hole.

He was going to be a father. Sherlock would not compete with a baby. He knew what John’s choice would be.

When you love someone, you put their happiness before your own.

Her death broke everything, completing the process that Sherlock began when he fell. That was the thing they could not talk about. It was, he supposes, what finally grew too painful to overcome.

So Sherlock texted, occasionally called, and John would call back, and they would talk about things that didn’t matter, conversations with uncomfortable silences, and finally an excuse to hang up, a promise to text him later.

The silence grew between them until it was too large, too fraught with everything unsaid, and there was no way back to what they once had. He sits with that silence most evenings.

John has lost a lot. He lives in the suburbs, takes train to a surgery where he works five days a week, and occasionally dates boring women. His daughter is ten years old. From what Sherlock can tell, this is the life he wants.

Weeks, then months, and this morning Sherlock notes that it has been a year since the last text.

How did this happen? He doesn’t have an answer. There was no argument, no declaration of change, no decision to move on, away from one another. Maybe this is just the ebb and flow of life: intense intimacy followed by annual Christmas letters.

His own life goes on much as it has. He works on cases, does experiments, walks the streets when he’s restless. The joy he used to take in these things has gradually dried up.

He listens to Mrs Hudson twitter on about nonsense and bring him toast and biscuits because that is how she cares for him, how she loves him, and that kind of love is not a thing to despise or reject.

He thinks about time. Fifteen years since he met John Watson, thirteen since he’d broken John’s heart by dying, eleven since he’d returned and felt his own heart break.

Mary has been dead for ten years. And John hasn’t been back to Baker Street for almost that long.

Maybe he and John are too broken to fix whatever is left. Maybe this is life: alone protects us (from each other). John, alone in his house in the suburbs; Sherlock alone in 221B. It’s better that way, less painful.

He remembers John living here, picking up the milk, making the tea, falling asleep in his chair. Sometimes he imagines John here, home. Sherlock hears the floor creak upstairs and knows that John is waking up, and soon he’ll be downstairs asking, _anything on for today?_

He imagines a cottage in Sussex.

He thinks about bees, about setting up hives and keeping a colony. Having a garden, maybe. Flowers, for the bees. Lavender and lilac, beebalm, rosemary and sage.

And he thinks about John living there with him, tending the flowers.

“You need to take some time off,” Mycroft says, looking across the table at him. He’s insisted that his brother meet him for lunch, and Sherlock is now trying to stomach the soup that is set before him. He’s never liked soup much because he was fed so much of it as a child, his mother never sure how to mother a boy who refused to eat and do normal things. Soup was the answer, always.

He sets down his spoon. “What for?”

“Because you’re in a rut, and it’s making you dull.”

“Well, you know all about being dull, I suppose. But, time off? What would I do?”

“The same things you do now, only with different surroundings. You should take a holiday.”

“Where would I go?”

The place he wants to be doesn’t exist anymore. 221B Baker Street, circa 2010. Case files littering the floor, unspeakable things in the fridge. He and John adjusting to one another’s habits, becoming an “us,” whatever that might mean.

The first time he took John to a crime scene, Lestrade asked, _Who’s this?_ And then, after a few months together, if they didn’t see John with him, people would ask, _Where’s John?_

They may not have been _together_ the way people hinted, but they were a couple. There are many ways to be together. Though he might not have used the word _love,_ it had always felt comfortable.

Sometimes, when he’s alone at night, he imagines himself back then, inside the door of 221B. They’re both breathless after a chase across the rooftops, laughing for the utter joy of doing ridiculous things. In his imagination, the scene plays out, but instead of going upstairs and finding a drugs bust in progress, when John asks what they were doing at Angelo’s, Sherlock says _proving a point._ And when John asks _what point?_ — in that moment, Sherlock closes the space between them, and when he says, _you,_ he’s millimetres from John’s mouth. They kiss.

And everything would be different after that. There would be no lies, no fall, no anger, no Mary…

“Does it matter?”

He startles at Mycroft’s voice, having forgotten the question.

His brother gives a world-weary sigh. “Sherlock, how much longer can you do this?”

_Do… this?_

“You need to think about it, brother. It’s dangerous work, and you’re getting older.”

“Do you think about it?” he asks. “You’re older as well. Are you planning to retire?”

Mycroft smiles thinly. “When I no longer enjoy what I do, yes.”

“Do you enjoy it?”

“Of course.”

This is news. Mycroft, who wears a permanent expression of bored annoyance, enjoys his work. But he thinks about retirement.

Except for fantasies about beekeeping, Sherlock has never thought about retiring. Early in his career, he assumed he’d be dead by thirty. At thirty-three, he met John. At thirty-five, he died for John. At thirty-seven, he lost John. 

Now he’s forty-eight, an age when most people have already started planning for retirement. He hasn’t thought about it.

Lestrade is retiring this year, he thinks. Donovan has been promoted, and doesn’t call him in on cases, even though he was exonerated years ago of the things she accused him of doing. He’s worked with a few other people at the Yard, but Lestrade’s retirement will leave a hole. Clients still contact him, ninety percent of the cases boring, but that ten percent keep him busy. He can keep doing this. The question is, does he want to?

“There are plenty of nice places to go,” Mycroft says. “If you make a reservation now, you could go somewhere in June.”

After this conversation, he considers all the places he’s never been. Though he’s traveled extensively, he’s never gone anywhere just for himself. He’d enjoy seeing Japan, he thinks, and Alaska. He’d like to stand inside the Arctic Circle in June, watching the midnight sun dip towards the horizon and rise up without setting. He’d like to think about being on a planet, spinning through space, silently measuring time in its revolutions.

He thinks about a cottage near the sea, beehives humming outside.

All those years ago, when he returned from being dead, he wanted to impress John. He wanted to hear _brilliant_ and _amazing._ It was a mistake, he realises. The thing that had brought them together wasn’t brilliant deductions or ridiculous chases over rooftops; it was quiet evenings, a companionship that didn’t need words.

After the debacle at the restaurant, he remembers going back to Baker Street and seeing his things in boxes, all traces of John gone. He set aside what he’d imagined: John happy to have him back, the two of them unpacking those boxes, rebuilding a shared life. Those things would never happen now. Sherlock had come home to a place that was no longer home. John has his own life, without Sherlock.

His violin case is tucked away in the closet. These days he doesn’t play. His fingers have become somewhat arthritic, and he can’t play the difficult Paganini and Tchaikovsky he prided himself on. Besides that frustration, the violin reminds him of nights when he played for John, giving him good dreams.

It’s time to play again, he decides.

He hates being so clumsy, sounding like a beginner. There is no remedy for it but practice. As he plays, his fingers gradually regain some dexterity, and he begins to compose his own tunes, focusing less on the technical aspects, more on the emotional importance of each note, playing with an intensity he has never before attempted. The difference, he decides, is that his heart has been broken. In breaking, though, it has learned to sing.

Sherlock’s heart healed from the bullet that Mary put there. It has never really healed from the loss of John, but it has learned patience. Its song is mournful, soaring with love that has endured.

He lost John slowly, without either of them deciding that’s what would happen. The way to come back together must be so gradual that it’s almost imperceptible.

He begins with a text: _How are you?_

The reply doesn’t come at once. An hour later: _Sherlock?_

He’s been waiting, sends his answer: _I was thinking about you, wondering how you are._

_— You’ve stopped signing your texts._

_— As a wise man once pointed out, you already know it’s me. SH_

_— Ah, there you are! Much better._

_— How are you? SH_

_— I’m fine. Just back to work after a bout of flu. How about you?_

_— I’m fine. SH_

_— Listen, I have a patient waiting. Can I call you later?_

_— Of course. I’d like that. SH_

_— Later, then._

John doesn’t call that day, or the next. Sherlock remembers that last text and the year of silence that followed. Maybe it isn’t meant to be. Maybe he should let John slip away and not make him feel guilty for ignoring Sherlock, for letting their friendship end with an unanswered text.

But he’s learned patience, and parses the short conversation. John was surprised, but not reluctant to respond. He is busy, but not outright rejecting a conversation with Sherlock. .

The text is there, on John’s phone. The next time he goes to send a text, he will see it and remember.

Sherlock waits.

_— Sorry I never called back_

_— So many people are sick at work, I’ve been filling in._

_— I just forgot_

_— Are you all right? SH_

_— I’m fine_

_— You’re working too hard. Can you take some time off? SH_

_— Maybe. I have some days saved up_

_— You should get out of town, go somewhere interesting. SH_

_— Yeah… No idea where that would be_

_— Iceland SH_

_— ???_

_— The midnight sun SH_

_— We are approaching the summer solstice. If you go there now, you’ll have more hours of daylight to explore. SH_

_— And there are volcanos. SH_

_— You’ve thought about this_

_— I have. June is the ideal month to travel above the Arctic Circle. SH_

_— Have you been there?_

_— Not yet. Someday, I hope.SH_

There is a longish pause. Sherlock notes the time, realises that John is on his lunch break. He puts his phone back into his pocket. It buzzes almost immediately.

_— Look I gotta get back to work. I’ll call you tonight._

_— I promise I will this time. I’m making a note right now so I won’t forget_

_— I’ll talk to you later, John. SH_

John does remember. He calls at nine that evening, and they talk easily, catching up. Rosie is spending the summer with her aunt in Edinburgh and the house feels empty. He hates his job at the surgery and is looking for something else. He’s thought about leaving London.

Sherlock listens. He wants to tell John, _don’t be an idiot. You’ll never be happy anywhere but London. You’ll never be happy doing anything but carrying a gun, chasing suspects, examining murder victims, solving mysteries._

But that’s what Sherlock wants. People change. John is no longer the broken soldier he was fifteen years ago. He’s no longer waiting for his life to happen. He’s older, and has probably started noticing the little things Sherlock notices: the creaking of his knees, the number of grey hairs that keep appearing, the way he has to hold a letter or a chart further away to see what it says.

He’s watching his life pass by, wondering what it’s all for.

Sherlock listens. He doesn’t remind John of what is past. _Remember when you shot the cabbie? Remember the Chinese circus? The great hound? Remember when you said I was your best friend?_ Those memories will lead straight to the one they can’t talk about. _Remember when I lied to you? When I didn’t trust you enough to tell you I wasn’t dead?_

He lets John lead the conversation. He’s more talkative than Sherlock remembers. He sounds… lonely.

That’s something Sherlock understands.

“And how about you?” John asks. “What are you doing these days?”

“The same,” he replies. “Lestrade is retiring in December.”

“Wow. That’s… hard to believe.”

He’s thinking what Sherlock is thinking: _Where did the time go?_

But that isn’t a conversation they can have yet. Sherlock keeps it light. He mentions that Mrs Hudson is well, but her niece has moved in with her. He doesn’t mention that Mrs Hudson is seventy-five now. He’s always thought of her as old, but never ageing. She is still completely with-it, wearing her purple dress and kitten heels, but she’s slower now. She complains about her hip, that it’s not just a minor annoyance. She insists that Angela has only come to live with her because of a bad divorce, but it seems fortunate to Sherlock that someone can be there with her all the time. He has privately suggested this to Angela, who agrees.

He doesn’t talk about time, because the more he notices, the wider the gap seems to grow. He wants to cross the gap between them before it’s too late, before they’ve forgotten what it used to be like— but he can’t hurry things.

It’s half ten when he hears John yawn.

“You have to work tomorrow,” he says.

“Yeah. This has been nice, Sherlock,” John says. “I hope we can stay in touch. I really want that. Maybe have lunch or something.”

“I’d like that.”

They don’t set a date for lunch, but John calls him a week later, telling him about a patient who came in with odd symptoms. Sherlock tries to guess, but gets it wrong. His knowledge of anatomy is excellent, as good as John’s, and he knows the effects of every poison, but he is not an infectious disease expert.

“Dengue fever?” he guesses.

“Close. It was chikungunya. He’d just come back from the Caribbean.”

They chat a bit about epidemiology of mosquito-borne diseases, and it makes Sherlock smile because it’s something they do, chatting about death and disease.

They agree to meet for lunch at a cafe close to where John works. Sherlock isn’t tied to a schedule; he can make the trip across town since John has only an hour for lunch.

On the day they’ve arranged to meet, Sherlock gets an interesting case. He almost turns it down, but Lestrade is insistent.

He texts John: _I have a case. Can we postpone until tomorrow? SH_

— _No problem. How good?_

_— A six, maybe. SH_

_— Should I feel insulted?_

_— Why would you? SH_

_— Being stood up for anything less than an eight is embarrassing._

He follows this text with a laughing emoji to let Sherlock know he’s not serious. This was something John had to teach him a long time ago, how to understand sarcasm and teasing. It makes him feel warm inside to think of John typing and smiling.

It’s almost… flirtatious.

He texts back: _I wouldn’t stand you up for a six. Not even an eight. But Lestrade is demanding that I drop everything and help. SH_

As he hits _send,_ Lestrade says, “What are you smiling about?”

He tucks his phone back into his pocket. “Just texting John.”

Lestrade looks interested. “You’re talking to him again? I thought you two had broken up.”

He rolls his eyes. “As you well know, we were never dating.”

“I know. But you’re still friends?”

He has to think about this. Texting is once again a thing they do. And they’ve talked on the phone. He hasn’t actually seen John for while. It was Christmas, he recalls, and he’d run into him doing last minute errands. The shop was crowded and noisy, not ideal for a conversation, so they’d parted, agreeing to have lunch after the holidays. There had been that text, and then nothing. 

“Yes, we’re friends.”

Lestrade looks unconvinced, but nods. “That’s good. I just haven’t seen him in ages, and hadn’t heard you mention him.”

His phone beeps and he fishes it out of his pocket.

_— tomorrow’s fine same time same place yeah?_

He smiles again. — _See you then SH_

“To be honest,” Lestrade says, “I always wondered why you weren’t.”

“Weren’t what?”

“You always seemed like a couple. It would have been natural if you’d been more than friends.”

People used to make that assumption quite often. John always insisted he wasn’t gay. And Sherlock, thinking it was a binary thing, hadn’t considered the possibility that he might be something in between.

Even now, he hasn’t been thinking of that. All he wants is to have his friend back. To feel comfortable with him, to miss him if he hasn’t heard from him in a day. Maybe to sit in his chair some evening and look across at him, sitting in his own chair.

He moved John’s chair out once, when he was angry. John was married, and had a life that included Sherlock less and less. The empty chair reminded him of this fact, so he moved it. He told John it was blocking his view of the kitchen. _Well, it’s good to be missed._

Of course he’d missed John. But John didn’t want Sherlock _._ He didn’t want _that._

He frowns at Lestrade. “More than friends?”

Lestrade rolls his eyes. “The most observant man in England is still an idiot.”

He buries this observation and focuses on the crime scene. By mid-afternoon, he’s solved it. As he leaves the scene, he pulls out his phone and texts John.

— _Not even a six. Maybe a five, if you squint at it. SH_

The reply comes at once.

— _I’m sure you were brilliant_

_— It wasn’t complicated. SH_

_— Nevertheless_

He feels restless, eager to see John, and almost asks him if he can meet for dinner.

No, John suggested lunch, which is different from dinner. Different implications, different expectations. Meeting for a meal in the middle of the day means John has somewhere to be afterwards and sets a definite limit to the event.

Sherlock can wait. He must wait. This is too important to mess up.

They meet for lunch. Initially it’s awkward. A handshake seems too formal; hugs aren’t something they do, except that one time. They smile at one another, say the expected things, and sit.

John is a bit greyer, but it’s no surprise; he’d already started turning grey in his thirties. At fifty-one, he’s earned every grey hair. He looks tired, but they talk and he seems to revive. Sherlock tells him an embarrassing story about Mycroft. John laughs. It’s a beautiful sound.

“So.” John is about to say something awkward, Sherlock deduces. Maybe he should head it off, ask if he’d like to share a piece of cake or something.

John clears his throat. “So, Baker Street. Do you have a flatmate?”

“No need,” he says. It might seem strange if he doesn’t ask about John’s situation, but he’s not sure he wants to know about John’s love life. It’s not as if Sherlock has any claim on him. For now, they are two old friends reconnecting. “How is Rosie?”

“She’s fine. She and Harry are doing girl things, no dads allowed. I miss her, but it’s kind of nice too, having time to myself. Actually, I’m thinking about selling the house.”

The house, as he recalls, is fairly small. He and Mary bought it because they were expecting a child and had to think about safe neighbourhoods, with schools and playgrounds. Just two bedrooms up, a living room and kitchen on the ground floor. A small garden out back. He’s lived there since he and Mary got married. Even after Mary died, he and Rosie stayed.

Maybe he’s thinking of marriage, maybe he’s met a woman with kids and dogs… Or maybe _she_ wants to move out of London… He stops himself. It’s pointless to hypothesise without facts.

“Why?” _Why now?_

John shrugs. “Need a change, I guess.”

He’s pretty sure John has thought about marrying again, but he would have said if he was dating anyone seriously. Sherlock has given him an opening to say that, and he didn’t.

Not knowing what else to say, he nods. “Change is good.”

“I’ve got to get back to work,” John says, patting his pockets.

“My treat.” Sherlock motions to the waitress and hands her his card.

“Thank you.” It sounds formal, awkward, and all wrong. Maybe they should have just split it.

“You can pay next time,” Sherlock adds.

He doesn’t miss the sudden light in John’s eyes. “Good. Next week, maybe?”

Summer turns into a damp, chilly autumn.

Lunch has become a habit with them, or at least a pattern. They alternate between a couple of restaurants near John’s surgery, taking turns picking up the cheque. Sometimes one of them has to cancel, but they see each other at least three weeks out of the month.

Sherlock talks about his cases, John talks about the surgery and about Rosie, who’s just started secondary school. Gradually, they move into more personal territory. John mentions that he hasn’t looked very hard for a new job; he’s not unhappy, just feels that something needs to change.

“Have you contacted an estate agent about the house?” Sherlock asks.

“No, I think I should look for a job first, see what’s nearby.” He smiles at Sherlock. “I suppose you’ll never move.”

“Not yet.”

John cocks his head. “Yet? You mean, you might someday?”

“I have some arthritis,” he admits. He doesn’t admit how shocked he was when he heard this diagnosis. “Mostly my knees and hands. The stairs are not a problem yet, but eventually... And when I retire, there’s no reason for me to stay in London.”

“You’re thinking of retirement?”

“Not seriously. The cases are still interesting, and I’m still physically able. It will be a while before I have to think about it.”

Lestrade is retiring, and he’s fifty-nine. In eleven years, Sherlock will be that age. Eleven years ago, he was returning from the dead. He popped into the restaurant where John was moving on with his life, proposing to an assassin. He made fun of John’s moustache. In eleven years, he’s learned a few things about John Watson.

John sips his tea, looking thoughtful. “I think about it sometimes.”

“What do you think?” he asks.

John shrugs. “I used to think… about writing a book.”

Sherlock used to make fun of John’s blog, his writing style, the way he romanticised every case. And John always said, _But the romance was there._ Sherlock can’t deny it. He misses it.

“You could do that,” he says. “I would read it.”

The look John gives him is almost shy, his cheeks pink and his smile tentative. “Would you?”

“Of course.” He looks out the window. “What would you write about?”

John stares into his tea. “There are a lot of cases I never wrote up.”

 _And there could be more_ , he thinks. “I would read them.”

He reads up on honey bees. Fascinating creatures. They hear sound through their bodies, and communicate by dance. They have a complex social network, not unlike humans. They were first domesticated in Northern Africa almost nine thousand years ago.

He’s made an appointment with an estate agent to look at houses in Sussex. It’s good to have a goal.

She shows him several cottages. He notes what he likes and doesn’t like, and she takes notes. If she finds anything likely, she will let him know.

There is no hurry.

He makes deductions. John was dating someone when Sherlock sent him that first text in June. She was a coworker, he thinks, not a nurse but a doctor. By the time he and John had their first lunch date, that had ended. John is restless, sometimes unhappy, because he thinks he has lost the chance at happiness. His work is boring, but he’s not sure what he’s looking to replace it with. He’s seeing a counsellor. He mentioned it once when Sherlock asked to reschedule lunch, saying that he had an appointment the following day and probably wouldn’t be able to meet for an early lunch. He never talks about his counsellor.

In November he thinks about John abducted, gagged and tied up in a bonfire, eleven years ago. He used to have nightmares about that, and he supposes John does, too. There isn’t any good way to mark an occasion like that, so he doesn’t.

Two weeks after Guy Fawkes, he calls John and invites him to Lestrade’s retirement dinner. It’s not for a month, but he hopes they can go together. 

John says that _of course_ he’ll come. Lestrade is his friend, too.

Mrs Hudson is in pain. Her niece tells Sherlock it’s her hip, the one that’s been gradually deteriorating. Suddenly, it’s unbearable, but she is resisting the surgery.

“They want to take parts of my bones out of me,” she tells Sherlock. “They use saws to cut the joint out, and then put in a titanium thing, glue it to the bones.” Her eyes fill with tears. “Herbal soothers don’t work anymore. It hurts all the time.” She shakes her head. “Getting old is not for cowards.”

He smiles and takes her hand in his. “You’re not old. You’ll never be old. People younger than you have joints replaced. Our bodies wear out because we use them. Isn’t it a good thing that we can get replacements for the worn-out parts? Like putting in a new furnace filter, or replacing the floorboards that have warped with new ones. No more squeaking. Happens all the time. Nothing to be afraid of.”

“Oh, Sherlock,” she says. “I’m not afraid. It’s just a reminder that one day I won’t be here anymore. I don’t like to think about it.”

“You have a lot more years in you, Mrs Hudson. Have the surgery. I’ll be there when you wake up.”

She does. When she wakes up, he texts John to tell him she came through fine. He promises to stop by after work.

She’s in and out of consciousness all afternoon, talking about Florida, her husband, and their son who died. He doesn’t correct her when she calls him by the dead son’s name. He tells her that she’s been like a mother to him, and he will always take care of her, the way she’s taken care of him, through everything.

At one point she opens her eyes, frowns at him, and asks, “When will John come home?”

He doesn’t know what to tell her. He can’t promise that John ever will come home.

“He needs to come home,” she says, closing her eyes. “He’s been away too long. You need each other.”

By the time John stops by, she’s more coherent and feeling fine. The morphine is working well, and she smiles sleepily. “My boys,” she says. “Together again. Like old times.”

And John doesn’t remind her that he’s not gay or that he’s not living at Baker Street, and she falls asleep again, smiling.

They buy sandwiches in the hospital canteen.

“I haven’t seen her for a couple years.” John shakes his head. “No, more than a couple. I feel bad that I’ve neglected her.”

Feeling guilty won’t help, Sherlock thinks. Anything he says in response will sound judgmental, or like an excuse.

“She’s healthy,” he says at last. “And she seems happy. Her niece takes care of most of the housework now.”

They sit with their own thoughts for a while, sipping terrible coffee. If he were to ask John, would he move back to Baker Street? He’s not sure John is ready for that, but knows he’ll never ask. It’s up to Sherlock to suggest it, without putting any guilt on him.

Maybe it isn’t a good time, while he’s feeling guilty about Mrs Hudson. It will put him in a quandary, feeling he owes it to her, and not thinking about what he really wants.

“Sometimes,” John says, “I wish I could erase the years. I imagine myself waking up and you’re banging things around in the kitchen, yelling for me to get dressed. It’s tragic how we never realise what we have until…” He sighs. “I miss… the way things used to be. I miss…” He awkwardly wipes his eyes with a paper napkin.

“What do you miss, John?”

“I miss… us.”

John’s hand is on the table. It’s an offering, Sherlock can see, an opening. He slides his hand across to meet John’s, takes his fingers. At once, John grabs on, holding on as if rescue has finally arrived.

“I’m sorry.” Tears roll down his cheeks. But he doesn’t let go.

“What are you sorry for?”

“For being such a mess. For not understanding anything. For waiting so long. For making you wait.”

“It’s all right, John.”

John presses the napkin to his eyes. “It’s not all right.”

“Then… it is what it is.”

They sit like that for a long time, holding hands across the table.

John shakes his head. “I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not.”

He sighs again, takes his hand back. “I’ve been seeing a counsellor, trying to sort things out. I didn’t mean… the silence for all these years. I thought I should avoid you, so I wouldn’t drag you into my… issues. My anger has already hurt you so many times, and I didn’t want… and then you texted me, and I wanted…” He trails off, closing his eyes and biting his lip.

“We’ve hurt each other,” Sherlock replies. “But we’re past that, I think. The hurt we’ve caused each other will always be there, but so will the good things. I don’t want to forget those months we lived together, and I’m willing to remember the things that happened afterwards if I need to, just to keep you in my memory. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, John. I don’t want to lose you.”

“I know,” he whispers. “I don’t want to lose you either, Sherlock.”

“You won’t. You can’t.”

“I’m not sure.”

Sherlock nods. “I’ll wait.”

And he knows that he can.

He’s spent ten years alone, and as the days grow shorter, the nights longer, he sits by the fire, waiting. Outside it’s cold and dark, and he makes do with what he has, feeding the fire, reading about bees, thinking of a cottage in Sussex where one day John might be willing to live with him.

On December 21, there are just four hours of daylight in Reykjavik, nineteen hours of night. When the sun rises tomorrow, there will be a little bit more light, too little to notice. Gradually, the light will return.

Soon John will arrive in a cab, and they’ll go to Lestrade’s retirement dinner. Rosie’s spending the night with a friend, so John doesn’t have to worry about getting home at a certain time. Sherlock listens for the cab. He’s wearing a slim black suit, and newer version of the purple shirt John always preferred to the others. He actually did an experiment on this once, noting the number of minutes John spent looking at him in different color shirts. Purple was first, by far.

He walks downstairs to tell Mrs Hudson he’s leaving soon. She’s been home for a couple weeks now; her niece takes her to physiotherapy three times a week. She hates the walker, the flat shoes and compression hose she’s supposed to wear.

She smiles to see him so dressed up. “You look very handsome, Sherlock.” Her eyes twinkle. She knows it’s all for John.

“Don’t wait up,” he tells her, returning her smile.

And then John is at the door, letting himself in with the key. “I guess I forgot to return this,” he tells Mrs Hudson.

“It’s your key John,” she says. “This is still your home.”

John is wearing a new suit. He’s lost the extra weight he put on after he married, and looks very trim. The moustache is long gone, but he’s grown a little beard that drives Sherlock mad, thinking of how it would feel against his own cheek.

John smiles, leans down and plants a kiss on Mrs Hudson’s cheek. “Thank you.” Turning to Sherlock, he says, “Ready?”

The dinner is tedious, as all retirement dinners are. During pre-dinner cocktails they stand together, checking out the crowd to see who they know. Sherlock fills John in on people he would remember, introduces him to a few of the new officers he’s worked with.

Sally Donovan approaches, smiling, perhaps because she’s had a couple drinks, perhaps because she doesn’t run into Sherlock often. She has never apologised to him, and he has never asked. At this point, it seems churlish to be resentful, so he nods and gives her a friendly smile when she reaches them.

“John Watson,” she says. “What are you doing these days?” She nods towards Sherlock. “Still friends with this one, I see.”

It’s an innocuous thing to say, and it doesn’t have any teeth in it. Sherlock is thinking of a way to reply that isn’t too snarky, when John slides his arm through Sherlock’s.

“How have you been, Sally?” He smiles.

Sherlock notices that Sally notices John’s hand. No ring, fingers lightly resting on Sherlock’s arm.

They chat for a few moments, Sally catching John up on her promotion, her marriage, and not saying a word about Philip Anderson, who has disappeared into the online world of conspiracy theories. His blog is quite popular. Sherlock will tell John about it later.

John smiles and says polite things. He doesn’t say, _not his date._

There’s no head table, no prearranged seating, and as soon as Lestrade sees John, he invites them to sit with him. He introduces John to his new wife, calling him _Sherlock’s friend._

As they are seated, John leans close to him and whispers, “Was that okay?”

“Of course you’re my friend,” he replies.

“No, I mean.” John squeezes his arm.

Sherlock's traitorous face flushes with pleasure. Not knowing how to reply, he takes John’s hand in his. “John,” he says softly.

The light in John’s eyes when he looks at Sherlock answers him. They’ve waited, and it hasn’t been too long. Sherlock never wants to let go. He wants to kiss him and feel John’s beard, rough against his cheek. He wants to finally tell him what he feels. There’s no hurry, though.

They’re a bit pissed, but not nearly as drunk as Lestrade, whose wife steers him into a cab. They walk for a while, not seriously looking for a ride, no destination in mind. It’s close to midnight and snow is beginning to fall.

John takes his hand, but says nothing. Sherlock holds his breath.

This is more than he ever thought he could have, and he finds himself hoping. Maybe he’s read John wrong, but he has to say—

“Come home,” he says, pulling John close. “Come live with me, you and Rosie. She can have the upstairs room, and— Come back. Come back to me.”

John’s eyes are very bright as he looks up at Sherlock. “Oh, God,” he says. “I’ve missed you so much.”

The kiss happens in slow motion, their lips barely touching at first, and then pressing. Lips part, and tongues touch. John opens to let him inside, and they’re holding each other so close, John’s beard scraping his face, his mouth tasting of champagne. He can feel John’s heart beating, his own pounding in reply.

They pull out of the kiss, and John is smiling. “I suppose I could sleep on the sofa.”

“You see, but you do not observe, John.” He kisses him again. “There is only one bed where you belong. Only one place, beside me, wherever that may be.”

John hums against Sherlock’s lips. “Hmm. Iceland, maybe?”

“Anywhere. Everywhere.”

The bells begin to chime the hour. Resting his forehead against John’s, he counts the strokes.

It’s December 22. 

They won’t notice the light returning for several days, maybe weeks. It will happen gradually, the earth tilting back towards the sun in its orbit.The sun’s light will last longer, and the day will outstrip the night. It will seem as if the light has never been gone, the world has never been dark.


End file.
